Columbia, South Carolina -- An atheist does not have to swear to a "supreme
being" to hold public office in South Carolina, the state Supreme
Court has ruled.

According to a report in The State, the court's five justices unanimously
agreed that the requirement violates the U.S. Constitution and upheld a
lower court ruling in the case of a College of Charleton professor. The
professor, Herb Silverman, is an atheist whose application for notary public
was turned down because he had crossed out the part of an oath that read
"so help me God."

"The state Supreme Court didn't hesitate to find the religious
test for public office to be a violation of religious freedom," Steven
Bates, Executive Director of the ACLU of South Carolina, told the State.

The ACLU had filed the original lawsuit in 1993 on behalf of Professor
Silverman.

The South Carolina high court agreed that forcing public officers to
acknowledge the existence of a "supreme being" -- required by
the state's constitution -- violated the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment
that provides for religious liberty and separation of church and state.

South Carolina was one of seven states that require belief in a higher
power to hold public office, the State said.

Arkansas, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas
have similar clauses, the paper said, but they don't enforce them.

After a three-year lawsuit, South Carolina Foundation member Herb Silverman
succeeded in August in overturning his state's unconstitutional religious
test for public office.

"It looks like I may have finally fulfilled my lifelong dream of
becoming a notary public," says the pleased professor of math at the
College of Charleston.

On August 9, the southeast version of the Wall Street Journal
recognized his achievement by placing him in their "winners"
column. "It's a wonderful day when a conservative newspaper like the
Wall Street Journal calls atheists winners," he added.

"The state cannot require any religious belief including a call
for 'God's help' as a requirement for appointment to office," wrote
Hughston.

Back in 1992, when Prof. Silverman applied to become a notary public,
he struck "God" out of the phrase "so help me God"
on the application.

Then-Gov. Carroll A. Campbell, Jr., and Secretary of State Jim Miles
both rejected the application.

Hughston wrote: "No religious test may be applied in considering
this application including that of the Constitution of South Carolina .
. . since (its religious requirements) violate the Constitution
of the United States."

The U.S. Constitution, in Article VI, expressly forbids any religious
test for public office. The Torcaso v. Watkins Supreme Court ruling,
unanimously overturning a similar religious requirement for notary publics
in the state of Maryland, was issued in 1961, yet several renegade states
refuse to rid their statutes of illegal religious tests.

Prof. Silverman fought another religious test in South Carolina statutes
in 1990, challenging the requirement of a religious oath for the Governor's
seat by running for governor himself as an atheist. A judge threw his suit
out of court as moot when he did not win.

The judge gave the Governor of the State of South Carolina 30 days to
act on Silverman's application.

The case is Herb Silverman v. Gov. Carroll A. Campbell and Secretary
of State Jim Miles, Order 94-CP-40-3594, dated August 2, 1995.

Columbia, South Carolina (EP) -- Political office in South Carolina
has a simple rule: atheists need not apply. It's not just that the Bible-belt
state's population is unlikely to vote for an atheist. In South Carolina,
there's actually a state constitutional requirement that all public officers
-- from Governor down to a notary public -- acknowledge the existence of
a "supreme" being.

Atheist Herb Silverman has taken his battle over that requirement all
the way to the state's Supreme Court. The 54-year-old math teacher from
Charleston filed an application to become a notary public in 1992. He was
rejected.

"Of 30,000 applications for notary public, this is the only one
that is from a devout atheist and the only one that has been denied,"
said Edmund Robinson of the American Civil Liberties Union, who is representing
Silverman.

But Brad Waring, an attorney for the state, said Silverman's application
was rejected because it lacked the correct number of signatures, and because
he had crossed-out the word "God" from the constitutionally required
oath of office.

"If the word protect, preserve or defend had been struck from the
application, the result would have been exactly the same," Waring
told the court. "There was no religious discrimination in this case,
and there was no evidence presented of it."

A lower court ruled that South Carolina violated the First Amendment
by forbidding atheists to hold public office. Circuit Judge Thomas Hughston
Jr. ruled that "The state cannot require any religious belief including
a call for 'God's help' as a requirement for appointment to office."
A notary public must pledge to fulfill their duties, "so help me God."
Republican Gov. David Beasley, who is a born-again Christian, appealed
the ruling.

Since 1868, the South Carolina Constitution has said, "No person
who denies the existence of the Supreme Being shall hold any office under
this Constitution." At least six other states -- Arkansas, Maryland,
North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Texas -- have similar clauses
in their constitutions, but do not enforce them.